ST. PARIS – Despite a few close matches early, St. Edward rolled over Graham in the pair’s annual wrestling rivalry, winning by a final score of 46-10 on Friday.
“A few of them, they had hammer guys. But tonight, we lost every close one. We lost every close match that we had. Those matches ran until the third period and some scramble or something happened, and we couldn’t capitalize on our end,” first-year Graham Coach Travis McIntosh said. “Hey, it’s a learning experience. In our mind, the first four matches could have gone our way. If you look at those scores in the second and third period, they were tight.”
Those first four matches – decisions lost by Nolan Gessler, Trace Braun, Dawson Show and Chris Kelly – put Graham in a 12-0 hole and forced the Falcons to shift their mindset.
“That’s 12 points. That would have made it 34-22. In your mind, that’s a different ballgame. You hope that guys can go out and not worry about anything else – just wrestle your match,” McIntosh said. “But that’s something we need to get more mentally focused on. You do your job, and you take care of the team.”
Graham’s Nick Moore pinned Scott Richter at 132 to cut the deficit in half and Falcon Alek Martin won a 12-3 major decision over Evan Bennett at 138.
But Graham couldn’t win another match, with D’artagnan Spitler (145), Jeffrey Thomas (152), Isaiah Stickley (160), Nolan Neves (182) and William Mannier (195) all looking over-matched and giving up bonus points to the Eagles.
Eric Thomas (170), Trey Pence (220) and Johnny Shafer (285) all lost hard-fought decisions.
